For the past four days I have been fighting a pretty bad cold. Mom has been all over me to “go see a doctor.” This comes from a woman who is losing sight in her left eye and doesn’t have a primary care physician because “I need one to be close to the house.” Evidently that means for her to have one living in the spare bedroom but I digress….

The next question from her was “Are you using Vicks?” If your mother is like my mother than Vicks is the greatest medical invention of all time. I remember as a child that at the first sign of a sniffle she would reach for that bottle, grab a spatula, and lap that stuff on my chest like she was frosting a cake. Then she would wrap me up like a mummy, grab a safety-pin to secure the gauze that she had affixed to my person to insure that all that “vapo rub” was absorbed into my entire being. When I would fart I would automatically clear the room of all bacteria. She would put so much Vicks on my body that it would affect my taste buds. I could stick out my tongue and it would glow like ET’s finger.

When I was in my motorcycle accident that resulted in six broken ribs, a broken nose, broken collar-bone, dislocated shoulder and a ruptured sinus cavity the first thing she asked the doctor was “How many times a day does he need Vicks?” Some may argue that Michael Jordan is the greatest commercial pitchman of all time but I would put my mother and a bottle of Vicks up against anyone.

I’d go on but the UPS man is at my door asking me to sign for a 55 gallon drum of Vicks my mother just sent me.